Passion and Data: a winning combination for charities!

Guest Blog - Ian J Seath, Director of Improvement Skills Consulting Ltd

I had a really interesting conversation about strategic planning with a senior leader at a charity that I have worked with. One of the great things about most charities is that people are so passionate about their cause and core mission. There’s no lack of enthusiasm and motivation to make a difference, but there’s never enough funding or resource to match these.

Our conversation led us to discuss the available data which could give an insight into where and how the charity could make the most difference and how this could be funded. So, for example, what’s the value of a big, showcase annual event if the cost to stage it leaves very little “profit” to invest behind beneficiary projects? At the other end of the spectrum, Dave Brailsford’s “1% Principle” might suggest that finding a low-cost (online) way of collecting millions of very small donations could aggregate funds into a sizeable pool.

Many charities have lots of data, but perhaps lack the capability or capacity to analyse it and draw out the insights. Sometimes the data is locked away in spreadsheets, sometimes it’s in a Donor or Beneficiary Management Database. An all too familiar trap charities can fall into is thinking that the answer to their data problem is to implement a new IT system, such as a CRM or donor management system. There are certainly plenty of software vendors out there who will happily sell you a system (either bespoke or out-of-the-box) and the annual licences to use it.  Invariably, charities underestimate the effort needed to clean and import existing data into the new system. They often end up with little more than an automated version of their previous data and perhaps no more insight into what the data might be telling them.

Passion without data will take you a long way, but in an increasingly complex and uncertain world, the danger is that you simply won’t be able to demonstrate the impact you are making and won’t be able to attract new funding. 

Start with why?

Passion is really important! Simon Sinek’s well-known TED Talk challenges leaders to inspire action by “starting with why?”. He argues that too many senior people spend their time talking about “how” their organisation works or, worse still, “what” it is that they do. Volunteers and donors support your organisation because of your “why?”. Charities that use a Theory of Change model (or similar) will recognise the need to collect data associated with all 3 of Sinek’s questions; why, how and what. 

Starting with why leads to another important principle assocaited with performance measurement: decide what you’re trying to achieve, then decide what you need to measure. Just because you have readily available data doesn’t necessarily mean it’s of much use to you. And, it will be of even less use if you simply automate its collection and reporting!

Nobody cares about numbers

In our conversation, we decided that data without passion was simply “boring”. Nobody really cares about numbers. When was the last time you got excited to hear someone saying, “I’m going to do a t-test” or “Let’s draw the regression line”?

Inevitably, there’s a 4-box matrix combining Passion and Data (consultants can always boil the world down to two parameters, can’t they?).

Insights to define strategy

On reflection, this is a slight variation on something Tom Peters said, way back in the days of ‘A Passion for Excellence’. He said, “Most improvement initiatives fail for one of two reasons, they either have passion without system, or system without passion; you desperately need both”.

I’m convinced that Passion plus Data could be a winning combination for many more charities.

If you’re working in, or with, a charity that has lots of passion but not enough insight from data, we can help you define a project to unearth that missing insight. These insights are the basis for better strategic planning and operational decision-making. They enable you to answer 2 key questions, where can your charity make a real impact and to what extent are you actually making a real impact?

Ian J Seath is a Director of Improvement Skills Consulting Ltd. He has worked with hundreds of clients, including in the Third Sector on consulting projects, and on a pro bono basis. He is a trustee of Dachshund Health UK and a member of the OR Society’s Pro Bono Project Team.